My Deep Dive Into Those Crazy Expensive Jordans
Alright so today I fell down this rabbit hole about the priciest Air Jordan 1s ever sold. Started simple – just typed “most expensive Jordan 1” into Google while drinking my coffee. Man, I wasn’t ready for this madness.
First thing I noticed was all these random numbers floating around. People claiming pair X sold for $100K, others swearing pair Y went for half a mil. Total chaos. I grabbed my laptop and dug into actual auction archives – like Christie’s and Sotheby’s official records.
What slapped me in the face: The real king isn’t some fancy collab. It’s this super plain 1985 OG “Chicago” colorway. Looks exactly like what MJ wore his rookie season. But get this – the pair that broke records had documentation showing MJ actually wore them in a 1985 game! Provenance papers and everything.
The crazy part was tracing the sale:
- Sat on eBay for months at $10K with zero bids
- Got pulled by auction house Goldin who verified the history
- Bidding war exploded between collectors and museums
- Finally hammered down at $615,000 private sale after auction
Here’s what blew my mind – the buyer wasn’t some hypebeast kid. Dude’s this 60-something surgeon who collects historical basketball memorabilia. Paid cash and just put them in climate-controlled display next to Kareem’s goggles and Dr. J’s jersey. Wild!
The real kicker though? Nike only charged $65 retail back in ’85. That surgeon paid over 9,000 times original price. Just let that sink in. My whole morning disappeared down this vortex, but man – sneaker culture gets crazier every time you scratch the surface.
